


Say it Now

by brilliantlyordinary



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Internal Monologue, John sucks at therapy, John's POV, Post-Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-26
Updated: 2013-03-26
Packaged: 2017-12-06 13:16:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/736116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brilliantlyordinary/pseuds/brilliantlyordinary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What John didn't have the time to say.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Say it Now

“The stuff that you wanted to say... but didn’t say it.” 

My voice was gravelly, clogged with grief, “Yeah.”

“Say it now.”

I’m sorry

and

You were the greatest thing to ever happen to me

and

You weren’t meant to die alone

and

You saved me and I never thanked you for it.

You were danger and life and starlight.

You were better than the solar system and I hate you because you did this to me.

and I could never hate you.

I could never hate you because...because....

I.... You were... inhuman. You were a god amongst us mortals and you knew it too. You selfish bastard. You knew you were great. The best. But it didn’t make you any less.

You shouldn’t have died like.... like that. Like a liar. I know you. I know you weren’t... that it wasn’t... wasn’t like that.

I remember... I remember seeing you there. On the ground. You looked so... broken. A man, stupid man, was shaking your shoulder, as if... as if you were only sleeping. Only sleeping and it was time to get up now. You didn’t react. The puddle of crimson around your head grew, spreading into the cracks of the pavement. I hated being a doctor then. Being in the army. I know.. I know when a pool of blood reaches a certain size...Your curls were soaked, dripping red, your fingers limp but still warm... still warm. Your blue, blue eyes were wide and staring, reflecting the sky and the crowd. Your face was so still, so sad, streaks of your own blood trailing across your face. I remember. I remember thinking... thinking to myself, that you were beautiful. A beautiful corpse. A beautiful broken man.  
There’s still never milk in the fridge. I forget I need it.  
There’s no body parts, no bloody heads.  
I miss them.

I never say brilliant. Or amazing. Or fantastic. Those were your words. Words used strictly for the genius of the one and only Sherlock Holmes. I’ll never hear them again. Never say them again.

You were supposed to die doing something fantastic, impossible. A firefight. An old-fashioned duel to the death. At least bringing someone evil down with you. But no. No no no. You had to jump. I never had you pegged as one for suicide, really. But it just figures. And I really should have known. The only thing great enough to off the remarkable Sherlock Holmes is himself.

You seem so arrogant now, committing suicide off the roof of a hospital. But now that it’s done with, I can see there could have been no other way. Nothing ironic or striking enough to quench your desire for the dramatic.

I’m just like you now. I don’t eat, but its not a choice, I just... forget sometimes. Lose the will. It’s amazing how lost you can get in your own head. I rarely sleep, only when it’s unavoidable. Only when my body, traitor that it is, takes over and forces unconsciousness on me. You would think that avoiding sleep so long would make me sleep soundly, dreamless. It’s not like that. Sleep isn’t... it’s not... a break. I still have nightmares, you remember, I know you knew. Every time they were bad enough to... to wake me up, I could always hear you. Playing your violin. Soothing. But the nightmares are different now. I can almost say I miss the old ones. The ones of Afghanistan and explosions. The ones of yellow sand and black-painted comrades. Now it’s a different battlefield. London’s battlefield to be exact. The crime scene of the pavement in front of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital.

And everytime I wake up screaming.

I had to move out, you know. Couldn’t afford the rent by myself, and even if I could have I would have moved. I woke Mrs. Hudson with... with my dreams. 

I stayed with Harry for a while but. But... There wasn’t... I didn’t... I don’t know. Its just wasn’t... wasn’t good. Me and Harry never got along but it was... worse. She would get drunk and cry and scream and I would stay sober, screaming and crying right back at her. We kept a noisy house.

Alone is much better. Well. Now. That... that you’re not... available. Now that you’re dead. 

But you were right. Alone is all I have now, and it protects me. No one wishes to spend time with grieving man, so I took myself away and now they don’t have to worry. Sure, a few people just can’t let it go, are determined to talk to me. It’s good I guess. They remind me to do things that I need.

Every once and awhile I get a call, or a unmarked black car, from Mycroft. I never answer or get in. I don’t know why he bothers. It’s not as if my livelihood could affect yours. Not anymore.

No one sends me condolences and letters to me here. I’m sure Baker Street is still flooded with them. “I’m sorry for your loss,” mixed right in with “I knew he was a fake all along.” And yet, none of them ever knew you. Not really. 

Not like I did. Or.. hope I did. Did I know you? Really, truly know you? Or did you have a mask for me too? A mask you even wore at home. Did anyone know you? Maybe Mycroft.

They wouldn’t let me see your body. They had Molly identify you. She did your paperwork, apparently. I don’t know if I would have been able to. I think I was crying. They all told me I was in shock, gave me a blanket. I remember it wasn’t orange. It was a sort of grey wool and I was so thankful. It was a blanket for a hospital, not a crime scene. I still have that blanket at home. Somewhere.

I lose things now. That never really happened before. Military habits and all that. I get lost now. Lost in my head. Ella tells me I’m depressed, gave me a prescription. I never took them. I... I think I lost them. She gave me sedatives too. For sleeping. I used one once, it was terrible. I couldn’t wake up, I was paralyzed, watching you fall over and over and over and over and over....... Your head would smash open against the grey, grey concrete and then suddenly you would be up again, talking to me. Telling me you were leaving your note. And then again you would fall, arms open to welcome the ground. Your body would crunch and break against the concrete and you would be up again. It was....

Ella knows I haven’t been taking my medications. She knows. But I’ll never admit it. I never say anything. I’ll never tell her the things I couldn’t say to you. They were only meant for you. And the saddest part is, you’ll never know. You’ll never hear how grateful I am.... how grateful I was... for you. For that. For what I had. With you. It was... it was untouchable. It was perfect and dangerous and brilliantamazingfantastic and... and... it was you. You were us.

But without you, I’m just me.

Nobody.

Dr. Nobody John Hamish Watson.  
Mr. Nothing Happens to Me.

People recognize me, sure, they say, “ Hey, aren’t you that bloke who was with Sherlock Holmes?” But I never say yes. I don’t want people to see me, to recognize me. I’m broken. It’s your fault I’m broken but I don’t want people to see that.

I’ve not seen Lestrade again. Not since the... the crime scene. The pavement and the blood and the sharp, cold scent of loss. He came after. After the crime, just as the police always do. Too late to catch the criminal, they spend their time trying to puzzle out the crime. There was no mystery here. Nothing to solve. You would have despised your own case. Nothing exciting about a suicide.

He took me home, to Baker Street. He told me he was sorry, that he hadn’t known, that there was nothing I could have done. None of us had known, had we? He told me your scarf and your coat had been ruined with blood but he gave me your gloves. That was it. All the evidence there was left from the crime scene that was Sherlock Holmes. I still have the gloves. I put them on sometimes, when its been a few days but I still can’t sleep and the world is starting to warp and I can pretend that my hands in your ill-fitting gloves are your hands, and you’re there. 

I don’t remember Lestrade leaving but he apparently did. He called though, a few days later, making sure I was still breathing. I was... I was lost then. I hadn’t moved from the chair he’d left me in. God knows I wouldn’t have, but Mycroft intervened, sending people to feed me and clean me up, careful I didn’t choke on the food or drown in the shower. They treated me like an invalid, like an old man who couldn’t remember that he had to care for himself. I reminded myself of a porcelain figurine I’d seen once as a kid. It was in a dusty little pawn shop, placed in the front window and obviously forgotten. It was the shape of a little man, coated in dust, chipped and lonely. The entirety of its surface was covered in a spider web of hairline cracks. I remember thinking it was sad, that it looked so lonely. I was just as cracked as that little figurine now. I had fallen apart at the seams, and there was only one string left to hold me together and pull me away from my gun, or the unused bottle of pills in my bedside table. I have to prove them all wrong. I believed in you. Still believe. Sherlock Holmes was not a fake.

I limp again. I hate it. I know it’s not real. But it hurts. It’s agony. I can’t even walk enough to... to... well, to do much of anything really. I’m useless. A useless waste of a man. I’m not even really a man. I’m a shadow. The shadow of Sherlock Holmes. It’s never going to be just me. I’ll never be good enough, clever enough, brilliantamazingfantastic enough to be recognized without you. Without Sherlock Holmes. Did you notice? Of course you noticed. You see everything.

Oh, but not me, never me. I was always there, a constant, never-changing. You didn’t need to see me. I never changed. And now I’m all alone. I’m all alone and I have a gun, I could use it. But I don’t. I never do and I never will because I have to wait. Even though I know. I know you’re not coming back, I know. No one has to tell me, I don’t need everyone’s pitying looks and empathetic wincing. I have to wait for you to come back. Because if you don’t come back... I have nothing. Hell, I already have nothing. But I can wait. I’ve been waiting for years, though I didn’t know it then. I’m patient. I’ve always been patient and hospitals and wars have honed my skills. I think that’s what I’m meant to do, really. Wait for Sherlock Holmes. Wait and hope and pray and be patient. Sherlock Holmes may be a great many things, the greatest of them brilliantamazingfantastic and the worst a heartless machine, but he always managed to fine me. That’s what I’d tell them. Always. Eventually. Maybe it takes years, but he’ll find me. He always did, didn’t he?  
I shook my head, unlaced my hands as they lay in my lap. 

“No. Sorry. I can’t.”


End file.
